Brazilians suffered 258 blows per hour in 2025; Crime has increased fivefold since 2018

There were 2.2 million incidents recorded last year (rate of 1,059 cases per 100,000 inhabitants), equivalent to 258 cases per hour. This is an increase of 429% compared to the 426 thousand records in 2018, the first year of the historical series. In relation to 2024, the increase was 3.1%.

The data is contained in the 20th edition of the Brazilian Public Security Yearbook and covers both face-to-face fraud, such as the machine scam, and those that occur via the internet.

The Forum says that this year's edition shows that embezzlement is consolidated as the main property crime in the country and that "there is an extremely worrying picture of growth" in the crime.

Conventional robberies go in the opposite direction. All crime indicators fell in 2025: vehicle crime fell 20.6%; that of residences, 19.9% ??and that of commercial establishments, 18.3%. Robberies against passers-by also fell (23.4%).

Overall, the number of robberies recorded in 2025, 610.9 thousand, fell 18.3% compared to the previous year, when 745.1 thousand had been recorded.

The incidence of fraud does not occur equally across the states because, according to the Forum, the phenomenon follows "the degree of bankingization, digitalization and integration into the financial system" of each federative unit.

Since 2021, legislation has punished cases of fraud carried out digitally, a number that has been growing - in 2024, 286.2 thousand police reports were registered; in 2025, 346.7 thousand. Three states did not provide the Forum with information on this matter: São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Ceará

São Paulo leads the records in both absolute and proportional numbers. There were 833 thousand cases of fraud last year, which gives the territory of São Paulo a rate of 1,808.3 cases per 100 thousand inhabitants, the highest in the country. Next come the Federal District (1,717) and Paraná (1,339.1).

Rondônia, where the embezzlement rate per 100 thousand inhabitants is the fourth highest in the country (1,329.6), is the only state in the North with high rates for this type of crime.

The data requires caution. According to the Yearbook, "states with a larger structure of specialized police stations and greater public confidence in the Justice system tend to present more records." The Forum says there is evidence of "huge underreporting" in the data.

In May, a Datafolha survey commissioned by the institution showed that 15.8% of the population aged 16 or over - or 26.3 million people - were victims of scams or lost money on the internet in the previous 12 months.

"If administrative records already demonstrate an alarming scenario of growth in scams and fraud, research indicates that the problem is much bigger than what actually becomes statistics in police stations", says the institution.

This occurs at the same time that embezzlement becomes an asset for criminal factions and reaches industrial levels, with large centers created in rented rooms and dedicated to carrying out mass scams.

One of them was closed by the São Paulo Civil Police in January this year. The room operated in a building on Avenida Brigadeiro Faria Lima, the country's main financial center, and was aimed at scams against the elderly. In total, 14 people were arrested on that occasion.

Investigations by the PF (Federal Police), the Civil Police of São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro and the Public Ministry of São Paulo have also shown that the PCC and Comando Vermelho are behind the phenomenon of multiplication of digital or telephone scams across the country.

"We know that there is participation, but to what extent this happens is still something to be analyzed," the Forum's program manager, David Marques, told Folha.

AMONG 2.2 MILLION CASES, 4.1 THOUSAND ARRESTED FOR STEAM

According to Marques, the Brazilian State has so far shown itself incapable of solving the problem. The insufficiency is revealed in the numbers.

Despite the 2.2 million cases registered in 2025, only 63.7 thousand criminal actions were initiated by state Public Prosecutor's Offices in the same period. Likewise, only 4,189 people passed through the penitentiary system from January to December for the crime of embezzlement - a figure that includes provisional prisoners, those still awaiting trial, or those definitively convicted.

The number of lawsuits grew compared to 2024, when 52,600 were filed, but the fact is that more than 97% of all frauds reported to the Brazilian police still do not reach the Judiciary.

For the Forum, "carrying out coups in Brazil offers exceptionally low risks of punishment, even for a country that has low general crime clearance rates."

There are legal reasons for this, says the Yearbook. The main one is in the Penal Code itself, which until the beginning of the year treated the crime as a crime of public criminal action conditioned on the representation of the victim.

In other words, the Public Prosecutor's Office could only denounce someone for the crime if the victim expressed this intention within a certain period, "a very explicit barrier for the perpetrators of fraud to be punished" in the Forum's assessment.

This changed in May this year, when President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT) sanctioned a bill by deputy Kim Kataguiri (Missão-SP) that allows the Public Ministry to prosecute someone for embezzlement regardless of the victim's statement.

The text also began to punish anyone who provides a bank account for third parties to transfer amounts arising from criminal activities. The penalty ranges from one to five years in prison, in addition to a fine.

If the account is used to receive money from electronic fraud, such as digital scams, the penalty is 4 to 8 years in prison.*Cases of embezzlement in Brazil, per year

In absolute numbers2018 - 426,7992019 - 523,8202020 - 927,8982021 - 1,312,9642022 - 1,816,4382023 - 2,000,9602024